


Saw Your Face, Heard Your Name

by UniverseOnHerShoulders



Series: I Think I'm On Another World With You [3]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, Poetry, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-03
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-10-17 19:14:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17566358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UniverseOnHerShoulders/pseuds/UniverseOnHerShoulders
Summary: Clara Oswald: English student, frustrated novelist-to-be, and accidental romantic poet. When she's hired to write a series of odes to fellow student Persephone Jones by the enigmatic Harry Saxon, she has no idea that her life is about to be blown apart...





	Saw Your Face, Heard Your Name

**Author's Note:**

> So, this fic is based largely on [this tweet,](https://twitter.com/hiitaylorblake/status/991775156761694208) and from there the idea kind of... grew. Enjoy.
> 
> Huge thanks to [Billie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hookedphantom/pseuds/hookedphantom) for reading this for me and giving enthusiastic gay feedback.
> 
> Also, happy 100th fic to me!

With each passing week, Clara is wondering with increasing desperation why exactly she’d opted to take Creative Writing: Contemporary Practice. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, she supposes, but now, faced with the daunting reality of attempting to produce enough content each week for critical analysis alongside working on the assigned reading for her three other modules, not to mention her dissertation, she’s beginning to regret her optimistic and naïve choice of module. End-of-undergraduate-degree Clara had been so full of hope. Middle-of-postgraduate-degree Clara… not so much. 

This week’s offering is poetry. She’s never been entirely sure about poetry – she’s found the bulk of it to be caught in the liminal space between the genius and the absurd – and she has so many other deadlines that she just bashes out any old thing, some ridiculous piece that’s loosely based on the burgeoning crush she has on a auburn-haired Scottish barista in the nearby coffee shop. _Her hair is like fire, her eyes are like the forest_. Some more florid similes, some artistic line breaks in unusual places, some adjectives. She reads it through once before she leaves the house then decides that _fuck it, it’ll do,_ and shoves her notebook deep into her bag and sets off for her seminar. 

It’s excruciating to listen to her peers’ offerings, it truly is. Clara isn’t purporting to be the next Alfred, Lord Tennyson, but she knows she’s still a better poet than the stammering, awkward, forced rhymes of her classmates. They stumble over the words they allege to have written – bullshit, she recognises at _least_ two from online poetry anthologies – and then fall back into their seats with tangible relief, awaiting the constructive criticism of their cohort. 

Clara isn’t trying to be bitchy, she really isn’t, but she doesn’t hold back with her feedback. She outright confronts those she knows to have plagiarised, and she queries iambic pentameter and line length and the formation of stanzas with those who have at least had the decency to come up with something original. She can feel the inherent dislike of her peers pulsing just below the surface of the room, low and uncomfortable, but she doesn’t much care. She’s not here to make friends. She’s here to get better at what she does – prose, thank you very much; this poetry business is something to be struggled through, and something to be struggled through _only_ – and to help others do the same. She’s not going to be that sycophant or that fawning hanger-on who tells everyone that they’re wonderful. These people will soon be English graduates, scrabbling around in the toxic atmosphere of London in search of jobs in exclusive publishing houses and indie magazines. They must learn to take criticism, and to take it well, and so she dispenses it with something akin to resignation.

When the time comes for her to present her work, she gets to her feet, takes a deep breath, and begins. It occurs to her as she’s halfway down the page that the subject matter might prove controversial, and indeed a quick glance around the room reveals a range of smirks and scandalised looks, but she shrugs it off. Let people gape at her. Let people talk about her. She keeps reading in a measured voice, and when she’s done, she sits down to absolute silence.

Nothing. 

Not so much as a breath is drawn as the entire group blinks at her in stunned stupefaction.

“Well,” the lecturer says with amazement, and Clara’s somewhat smug to see the old bat looks impressed. “You’ve been keeping _that_ gift under wraps, haven’t you, Clara?” 

Clara has no idea what she’s talking about. The poem is a rushed affair, scrawled across her notebook so hurriedly that the longer words are half-completed. _Univ. Ador. Starl._  

“Urm,” she says after a moment, realising a response is apparently required. “It’s not anything special.” 

“Nonsense. Does anyone have any feedback for Clara?” 

There’s a flurry of hands then, and a wave of meaningless, derivative criticism – nitpicking the kind of things that can only be nitpicked when there is nothing else to say and nothing else to note. She lets it all wash over her, nodding at the right times and making an ostentatious show of writing down what each person says, as though she actually cares. 

She doesn’t, of course. 

She’s just writing the same four words, over and over. 

_Damn this stupid module._

 

* * *

 

“Hey,” one of her classmates jogs up to her after class, his face a mask of awed reverence. She hates him for that at once – hates him for the way he looks at her like she’s some kind of literary goddess just because she produced one apparently half-decent poem. She’s not a goddess, nor a genius; she’s an idiot with a pen who wrote a subpar poem that apparently ticked a lot of people’s boxes. She’s not interested in fawning adoration, nor is she interested in dating anyone based off the back of her accidental revelation of her sexual preferences. She’s not going to be some anthropological experiment in the duality of human nature; no thank _you_.

“Wait up,” he calls, as she keeps walking determinedly, her notebook tucked under her arm. “Clara, wait. I just want to ask you something.”

“I’m not interested,” she says with exhausted resignation, deciding to cut him off before he can embarrass himself. “I’m flattered, but really not interested.” 

“I… know,” he stammers, looking confused by her blunt assertion. “I _really_ know, and nor am I.”

“Oh,” she feels her cheeks turn pink as she stops walking and turns to look at him. She’s not entirely sure of his name – she hasn’t bothered to learn anyone’s, other than the lecturer, but she thinks it might start with M. Matthew? Max? Something of that ilk. He seems genuinely contrite, and she feels a pang of guilt for her initial stab of loathing towards him. “Sorry. What’s up?”

“Well, I’m dating this girl, right,” he begins, looking abruptly nervous, but his face lighting up in that tell-tale way that indicates to all in the vicinity that he’s in love. “This _amazing_ girl. Junior doctor in emergency paediatrics… she’s been offered this big fellowship when she graduates, and she’s got the sharpest mind of anyone I’ve ever met, so I know she’s gonna absolutely smash it. Not to mention the fact she’s a total _stunner_ , and brave as a lion, and kind-hearted to boot. And it’s coming up to our two-year anniversary and I was wondering if you could… you know. Write her a poem. As a gift.”

“Write her a poem.” It’s not a question, just a flat repetition of his words. She’s too stunned to be able to say much else. 

“Yeah. What you wrote about that girl – that was beautiful. Genuinely beautiful. And if you could write something like that for Martha… I’d be so grateful.”

“I’m flattered,” she says gently, and his name comes to her in a flash. “Mickey, I really am, but-” 

“I’ll pay you.” 

She hates herself for how shallow she feels as her interest pique at the words. 

“How much?” she asks curiously. 

“How much do you want?” he counters, his face still open and earnest, and he’s already reaching for his wallet.

“Tenner?” she suggests, and he nods with gratitude. “Send me her photo and a bit about her. I’ll have it ready in a couple of days.”

 

* * *

 

She doesn’t think about it for that long, if she’s honest. She looks down at the photo of Martha Jones that Mickey has sent her, and at the little list of things she apparently enjoys, and she writes something in half an hour. Reads it through, tasting the words, measuring the rhythm. Mulls it over. Edits. Edits again. 

Sends it to him. The work of half an hour, and not only is she profiting, but it’s making someone else smile. 

His response is instantaneous; gratitude and awe, in equal measure, and thanks for her assistance. She feels a rush of warmth at having done something kind, and having made a difference to someone else’s love story. 

As she closes, her laptop, she realises it’s not a bad feeling. Not at all.

 

* * *

 

“Clara?”

She’s never spoken to this member of her seminar group before – not that she’s spoken to most of them, but this particular young man is almost as stubbornly silent as she is, sitting in his corner of the room and offering little in the way of content or feedback. He’s Scottish – broadly so, rolling the _r_ in her name lasciviously – and brooding, but now he’s looking at her with something sickeningly akin to admiration. 

“Hi,” she says awkwardly, unwilling to admit she doesn’t know his name. “What’s up?” 

“Mickey mentioned that you helped him out with a gift for his girlfriend and I was wondering if maybe… you could do the same for me.” 

“I…” she blinks, stupefied by the request. Had her work been that well received? Was Mickey likely to spread the word any further? She has nothing to lose; the previous poem had been the work of mere minutes, and this would surely be the same. “Yeah, sure. What’s her name?”

His eyes take on a dreamlike expression, and he grins soppily as he says: “Rose.” 

“Well, it’s £10 a pop; I’ll need a photo and a short description of her.”

“Done.”

 

* * *

 

Just like that, a business is born. It’s limited at first to those in the know – those in her seminar group – before word creeps around and she finds herself in demand from others on her course, then the undergraduates in the department, before word begins to spread amongst friends and housemates and teammates and colleagues, and soon she’s fielding requests from across campus; the entire range of social strata coming to her for their romantic poetry needs. 

She has to expand her horizons slightly, of course – discrimination would be bad for business – and write about men, but it’s a struggle; the words don’t come as easily as they do when she’s confronted by the photo of a woman. She finds it almost impossible to describe men in the same soft, delicate way that she can describe women. The words are more forced and the end products less honed, but she gets paid either way, so she doesn’t much care that some of the poems produced are below par. She’d like to be a perfectionist, but she can’t find the time to be; not with so much else at stake.

She tries, at first, not to fall in love with each woman she writes for, but it’s hard. Martha had been beautiful and Rose was too, in her way, but the veritable flood of photographs which begin to find their way to her inbox offer ample opportunity for daydreaming. She gives in to temptation and allows herself to fall, puts a piece of her heart into each poem she writes, and with each one she gives away part of herself, she feels – a small part of her soul, given to make another woman smile. 

 _It’s business_ , she tries to remind herself. _That’s all it is, and all it should be._

 She can’t help herself from falling in love a dozen times a week, though.

 

* * *

 

Harry Saxon is, by her reckoning, not her usual client. There’s none of the usual fervour and ardour in his gaze; none of the usual desperate yearning for the perfect gift, or mooning over the perfect girl. He stands beside her in the campus café in an all-black ensemble topped with a ridiculous goatee and eyeliner, his face coldly impassive as he surveys her in silence until she looks up from the Proust novel she’s reading and finally notices him. 

“Harry Saxon. Politics. PhD. I want a poem,” he says bluntly, not bothering with small talk. “Several, in fact. I’m willing to pay you handsomely.” 

“I only charge-” 

“Yes, I know your rates. But what you do is no mere task of obsequious frivolity. It’s artwork. You should be compensated accordingly. Would £500 suffice?”

Clara raises her eyebrows heavenwards at the enormous sum, trying to keep her face impassive. “Sure. For how many poems?”

“One a day for six weeks. Delivered directly to the recipient, ideally by post. I’ll provide her address and a book of stamps.” 

“Who are they for?” 

“Persephone Jones. Anthropology Department. Love of my life.” 

The words sound robotic and rehearsed, but his entire demeanour screams _compulsive control freak_ , so Clara lets it be. It seems easier not to question it. 

“And do you have-” 

She hasn’t even finished the question when the folder is thrust at her. That’s unusual in itself – her customers are usually more prone to use Facebook Messenger, or scrawled lists on paper torn from notebooks – but nothing about this man seems conventional, so she shrugs and shoves it into her bag. 

“Will that suffice?” he asks icily, seeming irked that she hasn’t looked at whatever is inside.

“It will,” she gestures to her book, irked that he isn’t taking the hint. “I’ll look later, I’ve got to finish this chapter by noon.”

“So, we have a deal?” 

“Yes, we have a deal.”

 

* * *

 

It’s not until that evening that Clara finally opens the folder. It contains thirteen photographs, each printed on immaculately glossy paper and showing a woman with short blonde hair and sparkling eyes. Harry appears in a couple, and then there’s several pages of information on Persephone, all of which serve to underline Clara’s burgeoning sense of adoration for the woman. Flicking through the notes, she is struck by the meticulous attention to detail that Harry has paid: elaborate lists of likes and dislikes, facts about her friends, details about her studies, and even what perfume she wears. Clara can’t help but smile at his obvious, obsessive devotion to this woman, and she can’t blame him.

Persephone becomes, in her mind at least, a fuller, more fleshed-out figure. This is quite unlike the other women Clara has written for – women who, while instant adoration was felt, were never more than 2D figures based on the absent-minded jottings of their partners. This is a woman who steps into Clara’s mind as a fully formed person, and she writes the first five poems in one impassioned blaze of inspiration, setting them aside to be edited come morning light.

£500 to fall in love with a woman for the sake of literature.

She laughs to herself as she puts her pen down.

 

* * *

 

Clara’s running late to her creative writing seminar on day eight of Harry Saxon’s exorbitantly well-paid six weeks of romantic poetry when it happens. She yanks the front door open and half steps, half stumbles outside, fumbling in her bag as she does so, when she collides with… someone. She’s not immediately sure who that someone is until she looks up and sees Persephone Jones, who is stood on the doorstep with her hands shoved deep into her pockets, face bearing the kind of expression that stops Clara in her tracks.

Clara isn’t sure what she was expecting. Gratitude, maybe? Or a smile, at the very least. 

Not this. Not this stony expression of absolute contempt. She feels her heart skip several beats. This isn’t how this is supposed to go.

“Persephone,” she blurts, then claps her hand over her mouth as she realises she has given the game away. _Idiot._  

“So, it’s you,” Persephone says in a numb voice, raising her eyebrows in stunned disbelief. “ _You’re_ the mystery poet.”

“I… urm…” Clara mumbles, then asks dumbly: “How did you get my address?” 

“I have my ways and means. How did you get mine?”

“Your boyfriend gave it to me.”

To her extreme consternation, Persephone dissolves into tears upon hearing this piece of information. Unsure of what else to do, Clara swears under her breath and wraps an awkward arm around the stranger’s shoulders, murmuring soothing platitudes as she reaches into her jacket pocket for her key, unlocks the door she has just tumbled out of, and guides them both back inside. Creative writing seminar be damned; this is far more important than discussing novellas. 

“OK,” Clara says with pragmatism, sinking down on the sofa with Persephone by her side. “Urm. Do you feel up to explaining what’s going on? Has he dumped you suddenly?” 

“No,” Persephone says miserably. “No, he’s… he’s not my boyfriend.”

“So, you’ve dumped him?” 

“Something like that, yes.” 

“I don’t understand.” 

“We met at a party during freshers week. He just… I don’t know, he really took a shine to me, and we went on a couple of dates, but then he started getting more and more intense. Knowing things about me that I hadn’t told him; turning up in places to wait for me – places I hadn’t told him I’d be. It was giving me the creeps and I couldn’t stand it and so I dumped him, but he keeps turning up like a bad penny. I blocked him, but he won’t… he won’t leave me alone and now he’s got you writing all these poems and I’m _creeped out_.” 

“I…” Clara blinks at her, guilt creeping over her, insidious and hot. “I didn’t…”

“You didn’t know,” Persephone says in a small voice. “It’s not your fault.” 

“I mean, he seemed kind of weird, but I didn’t think…” 

“He’s a master of deception. He’s ingratiated himself with everyone I know; he’s created fake profiles and stalked my social media accounts; he turns up outside my house. And then he stopped doing that, and I thought I was in the clear… and then these poems started arriving.” 

“How did you…” 

“My housemate is in your seminar group. Yaz Khan.” 

Clara frowns. The name rings a bell, but she can’t quite picture her. 

“Bunches. Leather jackets. Kind of cute.” 

“ _Oh_ ,” realisation dawns on Clara, who frowns. “And she recognised my work?” 

“It’s fairly distinctive, even if she didn’t know about your little sideline.” 

“I’m… I’m sorry. I had no idea that he was doing those things; like I said, he seemed weird, but he seemed genuine. I had no idea he was so creepy.” 

“He’s clever like that,” Persephone smiles sadly. “Very, very clever.” 

“Persephone-” 

“Don’t call me that. Please. That’s what my parents call me, and what he calls me – he thinks it gives him some kind of power over me, to use my full name.” 

“Sorry,” Clara says again, for want of anything more eloquent. “What would you prefer?” 

“Sephy.” 

“Sephy. I’m sorry. I’ll tell him he can stick his money, and his poems, and that he should leave you alone.” 

“No,” Sephy shakes her head hard, visibly horrified by this suggestion. “No, you can’t. You can’t anger him; it’ll only make things worse. You need to keep sending them, and just act like everything is fine. He needs to think he’s in with a chance.” 

“But if it’s making you uncomfortable-” 

“I would be a lot more uncomfortable if he knew you had stopped, because then he’ll start turning up at my door again. Just… play his game. Please. Can you do that?” 

“Of course,” Clara agrees, too numb to say anything else. “Of course I can.”

 

* * *

 

When the time comes to write the next poem, Clara feels strange. Sephy is no longer a distant entity now; no longer a construct in her mind. She’s a person, a real person, and she’s frightened and alone. Clara looks over at the folder that Harry Saxon has given her, neatly annotated and highlighted and covered with jotted ideas and inspiration she’d noted down upon her first reading, and she reaches for it and drops it into the bin in one impulsive action.

No more illicitly gained information.

From now on, she will work with what she knows of Sephy – what she has gleaned from their meeting, and what she knows the stranger-yet-not to need. She needs to be bolstered. She needs to be supported. She needs to be reminded that she isn’t alone. 

So that’s what Clara writes. She writes the words she would want to hear; she writes poems filled with double meanings – poems that could feasibly be about love, yes, but also contain implicit understandings of empowerment and solidarity. She hopes Sephy will understand; hopes to god that she will glean strength from knowing she is not alone.

 

* * *

 

On day thirteen, there’s a knock at the front door. It’s curt and punctuated with neat little pauses between raps, and for one awful moment Clara thinks that it may be Harry Saxon himself, come to impart that he’s aware of their illicit meeting, but upon opening the door with shaking hands, she instead finds Sephy, holding aloft one of the expensive envelopes Clara has been using to send her poems in. _In for a penny, in for a pound_ , she’d told herself, standing in one of the expensive stationery shops in town.

“Harry doesn’t control what you write, does he?” Sephy asks immediately; no prelude, no chit-chat, just straight to the point. 

“No,” Clara admits. “No, he doesn’t.”

“So these poems… they’re what… intended to be motivational? To make me feel _strong_ and _safe_?”

“Yes.” 

“And they’re by you? _Only_ by you, he has no say over what exactly you write? He doesn’t… approve them, or proofread them?” 

“That’s correct.”

“I thought you only wrote love poems.”

“I do, yes.” 

“So, all your customers get poems like this from you?” 

“No, the rest of them are…” Clara wonders how best to phrase it. “Not like yours.” 

“Why am I different?” 

“They’re usually not dealing with the same kind of situation that you are. I’m writing them in a different way.” 

“And what way is that?” 

“I fall in love with people as I write.” 

“In what sense?” Sephy narrows her eyes. 

“You have to fall in love with your subjects as you write about them, or else the art of the romantic poem is impossible. I take the information and photographs I’m given and my job is to fall in love with that person; to write an epic in twenty lines or less, and to make them feel the love that I feel for them in that moment.”

“So, by extension, you’re in love with me, and that why I’m receiving these empowering poems disguised as obsessive love poems?” 

“Perhaps a little, yes. The idea of you, at least,” Clara wants to say more; wants to explain herself and apologise for the way in which her work has been misconstrued, but Sephy cuts her off. 

“Because that’s just what I need,” she snaps, turning on her heel and beginning to march away. 

“Sephy!” Clara calls. “Sephy, not like… that isn’t…” 

“Go to hell.”

 

* * *

 

Clara deliberates for a long time on how to make things up to Sephy. She wants to explain herself; she wants to be able to communicate that she knows she phrased things badly, and that she’s sorry for not expressing herself more clearly and less inappropriately. She tones back the poems in the meantime, offering up only her blandest and most generic wording. No empowerment, little emotion, no personalisation. Certainly nothing approximating romance, save for the broadest overtures of affection that are required by the poems’ very nature.

She could write Sephy a card, she supposes, and stick it in an envelope with a poem. Would it even be opened? Would Sephy even grant it the time of day, or would she be in a hurry to get rid of it? Would she consider it to be motivated by selfishness, or would she see it as the act of penitence Clara would intend it as? She can’t bear to know that she’s being thought of as predatory, or dangerous. It’s impossible to do what she does without falling in love, and Sephy is no exception. 

Eventually, she realises there is another avenue open to her. 

Sephy isn’t difficult to find on Facebook. The issue stems from the fact that her privacy settings are so tight that Clara can’t message her, so she starts a conversation with Yaz instead and hopes to god that her classmate will have the good sense to facilitate a discussion between the two of them. 

_Clara: Hi. I was wondering if I could talk to Sephy? Her privacy settings are pretty intense, and I don’t think she’d accept a friend request if I sent her one._

_Yaz: Leave her alone, Clara. The last thing she needs is someone else mooning after and declaring their love for her. She’s had enough of that to deal with with Harry, she doesn’t need it from you as well. The bloody poems are bad enough._

_Clara: Please can I just… have the chance to actually explain? I didn’t have the chance to do it in person._

_Clara: Please?_

_Clara: I don’t want her to feel scared of me, that’s the last thing I want. I want her to understand what I meant by what I said._

_Yaz: Fine. I’ll hand the phone over. But if you end up blocked, know it’s a decision by committee._

_Clara: Fine._

_Yaz: It’s me. What do you want?_

_Clara: To explain._

_Yaz: So explain._

_Clara: When I said I loved the idea of you, I meant that. But I’ve loved the idea of every woman I’ve written to; loved the glimpses of their lives I glean and loved the way I’ve been able to dream about them. There have been doctors and scientists, psychologists and nurses, philosophers and historians. Every one of them, I’ve had to construct a narrative in my head. Every one of them, I’ve had to create that narrative and fall in love with them in order to fulfil my brief. I couldn’t write poetry without falling in love a dozen times a week, so I suppose you could say that I do it by design. It’s not the actual women though – it’s the ideas of them. I don’t have to live with the annoying way that they click their tongue when they think, or their habit of leaving the dishes undone. I just have to fall in love with the information I’m given – the way they smile, or what they love to read. And the information I had on you – Harry’s information, which I now know was gained in deeply wrong and deeply intrusive ways – created such an intrinsically detailed portrait of you, that I was able to write from the heart with far more ease than usual. I was in love with the shape and idea of who you were; that fully-fledged version of you that stepped into my head from the pages of information he gave me._

_Yaz: And?_  

_Clara: And then I met you, and you were so afraid, and so I took the shape of you that I held in my head and I tried to tell her the kind of things I know I would need to hear if I were in that situation. I tried to bolster her; I tried to reassure her that she was loved and supported, because she is loved – not loved the way I love, shallow and silly and superficial, for pay and for poetry – but loved deeply; by Yaz and by others around her. Around you. Because Harry Saxon is a dangerous man, yes, but you are surrounded by strong people and you are stronger than you know._

_Yaz: So, you’re not in love with me?_  

_Clara: Like I said. It’s more the idea of you. The version of you that I have in my head. Which isn’t you at all. And perhaps ‘love’ is too strong a word. ‘Enamoured with’ might be a better way to phrase it._

_Yaz: I see. I think._  

_Clara: Really?_

_Yaz: Yes, but you need to know that that version of me isn’t me. That’s the version of me he wants me to be._

_Clara: I know. I understand that now._

_Yaz: So why don’t I show you who I actually am? Because I’m not willing to have you hold that ideal in your head forever, and not willing to have you long for it._

_Clara: Is that… something you really want to do? Spend time with me?_

_Yaz: If it dispels the myth for you, then yes. If it means that when all of this is done, you’ll know the truth about who I am, then yes. And if it means I can lessen the fictional narrative that Harry Saxon is creating around my life, then yes._

* * *

 

Of course, they can’t meet in public. Clara isn’t sure of the reach of Harry Saxon’s apparent sphere of influence, but she trusts Sephy’s judgement and cedes to her request to come over for coffee rather than attempting to meet somewhere such as Starbucks. There’s a brief moment of awkwardness as Sephy steps over the threshold of the house, but then she relaxes as Clara sets down two mugs of her best coffee in the lounge, milk frothed to within an inch of its life with her housemate’s coffee machine, and the two of them begin to relax.

“You know,” Sephy says solemnly before so much as taking a sip, chewing on her lip as she thinks for a long moment. “I just… I don’t want this to be about him. I don’t want the two of us to spend time together knowing that the ghost of him is looming over us.” 

“So, we won’t mention him,” Clara says, taking a sip of her drink and then grimacing. “Also, can we not call him a ghost? He’s creepy enough as he is.” 

“This is true,” Sephy concurs with a knowing smile, taking a sip of her coffee. “You can see why he’s not my type.” 

“Very much so.”

“That and the fact I’m not really… interested in men in general. Saxon was the final nail in that coffin.” 

“Fair enough,” Clara grins at Sephy over the top of her mug, then tips her a conspiratorial wink. “Sensible choice. Women are far easier to fall in love with.” 

“Exhibit A sitting right here,” Sephy teases, and they both laugh then, the tension dissipating. “Do you write about men as well?” 

“Yes. Unfortunate necessity, I’m afraid.” 

“Do you write about them in the same way?” 

“I can’t fall in love with them the same way, so I can’t write about them the same way. It’s not as easy for me to love them – it’s not so much falling as bouncing painfully down a slope, hitting rocks and boulders as I go. It’s been a long time since I dated one, and a longer time since I’ve loved one. So, I try to force myself to feel something – the people I write for need me to. But it’s not the same.” 

“Why do it, then?” 

“Because the money is good,” Clara sighs, ruffling her hair with her free hand. “Because it’s a nice little earner. Because it’s something that doesn’t take me long, but the payoff is good – not just the money, but knowing I’ve made someone smile.” 

“It doesn’t take you long?”

“About half an hour per poem. Tops. I mean, I look at the photos I get, I read the notes – that usually takes a bit of time. But the actual writing? I try to limit myself to half an hour. I just let it flow and try not to force it too much. When I force it, it tends to get a bit… artificial.” 

“So, you’re a natural poet?” 

“No, I’m a novelist with a side interest in poetry for the sake of capitalism.” 

“You’re a novelist?”

Clara grimaces as she realises she has exposed herself to a whole other line of questioning. “When I have time, yes, which isn’t much now.” 

“What do you write about?” 

“People. The way they interact; the way they think. What drives them, and how their lives intersect.”

“Just like what I study.” 

“Yes, but more… literary,” Clara smiles bashfully. “Lots more metaphors and gloomy introspection. I don’t know. I’m probably not any good; I seem to just come back to the same two characters over and over again, watching the way they drift apart and together. And recently I haven’t had the energy – it’s all been given over to these poems.”

“Do you find prose as easy as poetry?” 

“Sometimes. Sometimes the words just pour out of me and my fingers fly over the keyboard and before I know it, I’ve done five thousand words. Other days… it’s like pulling teeth. The words won’t come, and I can’t make them, no matter how hard I try.” 

“But the poetry…” 

“That’s easy. That’s just falling in love; there doesn’t need to be the same depth of understanding there, or the same unpicking of motivation. The motivation _is_ love. The motivation is _always_ love.”

“So, write a poem about me,” Sephy says softly, her eyes wide and sparkling as she challenges Clara. “Go on. Based on what we’ve talked about so far, and what you’ve seen of me in our interactions; ignore everything Harry’s told you, and everything you think I need. Write a poem about me. Show me what you can do.” 

“Now?”

“Yes, now. Go on.”

 

* * *

 

_She’s not what I expected_

_Her words were once ferrous and cold; now warm and edged with something_

_Akin to amusement._

_Do I amuse her? The idea is earth-shattering_

_And I cannot help but wonder:_

_Is it my words or my being? Does my sincerity astound and amaze_

_Or do I sound a fool, unwittingly rendering myself complicit_

_In my own literary fate as I confess my struggles?_

_She asks this of me, with sparkling eyes_

_A look that suits her; a look that cloaks her fear_

_But I can see it still, simmering and uncertain below the surface_

_She’s afraid_

_She’s afraid, but she’s used to hiding it_

_She’s steel and ice_

_I want her to thaw_

_I watch her hands grip the coffee mug and the glow creep up her arms_

_Watch the way her smile becomes more genuine at caffeine’s prompting_

_She’s here to demonstrate truth_

_Expects reciprocity_

_She should know that I fall in love too fast and too hard;_

_Romantic love, platonic love; love in all its forms and glory_

_She should know that this feels like a fire starting_

_She should know that this isn’t a fire I want to extinguish._

* * *

 

“That’s beautiful,” Sephy says quietly, staring down at the scrawled words in Clara’s notebook. There’s a look on her face that Clara can’t quite read – it’s not quite shock and not quite surprise, but disbelief, perhaps; although disbelief at what, Clara cannot fathom. “That’s really beautiful.”

“Thank you,” Clara drops her gaze, rubbing the back of her neck self-consciously as she feels her cheeks burn. She’s unaccustomed to this; she’s used to being far removed from the recipients of her poetry, and if there are thanks due, then they usually come much later. Watching someone read her work about them is anxiety inducing enough, especially when that someone is someone like Sephy. 

“Do you really feel that way?” Sephy asks shyly, and Clara looks up at her in confusion. 

“What way?”

“That this is a fire starting?” 

“Yes,” Clara confesses, realising the veracity of the fact as she says it. “Yes, I do.” 

“You barely know me at all.” 

“But I want to. Not just to prove a point – not just to show me that you’re not what Harry Saxon thinks you are. I want to know you. Properly.” 

“You want to be friends?” 

“Yes,” Clara whispers, realising that more than anything, that is what she craves. “Yes, very much.” 

“You understand that this is a dangerous game?” 

“Yes.” 

“That if he finds out…” 

“Yes.”

 

* * *

 

Yaz corners her after their seminar the next day, setting her bag down on the table beside Clara as she packs up her things. 

“You understand that you’re putting her at risk, don’t you?” Yaz asks her bluntly. “That Saxon will find out, and then he’ll do something ridiculous and dangerous? He can’t stand anyone else going near her. Can’t and won’t.”

“You’re making him sound like a megalomaniac,” Clara shoots back, stuffing her notebook into her bag with a scowl. “He’s a slightly bonkers politics student, that’s all.” 

“A politics student with considerable time, money, and influence. Do you know what happened the last time he thought Sephy was getting too close to someone? He arranged for them to have an unfortunate accident.”

“What sort of accident?” Clara feels her heart skip a beat at what Yaz is implying. Surely it’s all just hyperbole; what damage could he truly do? “What do you mean?” 

Yaz holds up her left hand, and for the first time Clara notices the skin-coloured strapping that swathes her palm, encircling her wrist before disappearing up and under the sleeve of her jacket. “A ‘whoops, silly me, I didn’t see you there at the top of the stairs’ accident. Top of E block. I’ve had to spend a lot of time in the quiet study areas ever since, avoiding Sephy as much as I can. Even when we’re at home, I have to spend a lot of time on Skype speaking Urdu to my parents so she won’t try to bother me.” 

“But you…” Clara swallows thickly, struggling to understand why Saxon would feel so threatened by Yaz. “But you’re…” 

Yaz looks at her with a pitying, pleading expression, and the pieces click into place. 

“You’re in love with her, aren’t you?” Clara asks, and Yaz nods once, a jerky, nervous motion, as though afraid someone might see. “Since when?” 

“Since the first moment I saw her in the library in first year.” 

“Does she know?” 

“Don’t be stupid, of course she doesn’t.” 

“Yaz, I promise you… I promise you I won’t put her in danger. Or myself in danger.” 

“You have no idea what he’s capable of,” Yaz steps closer to her menacingly, her eyes burning with tears. “You have no idea of how much he wants her back.”

“Yaz…” Clara forces herself to remain calm, even though her heart is pummelling against her ribcage so hard that it’s a wonder the other woman cannot hear it. “I promise you. I will do everything I can to keep her safe.”

 

* * *

 

It isn’t until she returns home that she realises exactly what Yaz has done and exactly the predicament she now finds herself in. 

She has vowed to keep Sephy safe, in a way that Yaz can surely relate to – she had probably made the same vow once, and now… now she bears the ongoing scars of her own underestimations of Saxon, both physically and mentally, and has been forced to retreat to a safe distance from Sephy, for both of their sakes.

A safe distance.

The thought of retreating to a safe distance, leaving Sephy stricken and without support, abhors Clara. The notion of dangling the promise of friendship before her, tantalising and enrapturing, then yanking it away, is inconceivable. If all around her have already been threatened into submissive obedience by Saxon then Clara refuses to allow that to happen to Sephy again. There’s one option available that accords them the freedom they both need, and it’s less than ideal, but it’s better than simply extricating herself from Sephy’s life forever, leaving her confused and alone with the weight of Saxon’s ongoing presence. 

She dials Sephy’s number with shaking fingers, listening as the line rings once, twice, three times, before she picks up. 

“Hey,” Sephy sounds confused to be hearing from her so soon, and Clara can’t blame her. They’d agreed to meet again, but not for several days, and she can sense the tangible weight of the other woman’s worry. “What’s up?” 

“I’ve been thinking,” Clara says slowly, loathing herself for what she was about to say. “Maybe it would be best if we didn’t spend physical time together for now. Wait until the Six Weeks of Sappy Poetry is up, and then kind of… fling ourselves into this whole friendship lark fully.” 

“Has _he_ spoken to you?”

“No!” Clara says at once, realising how entirely unconvincing she sounds. Saxon may not have spoken to her directly, but his influence has been exerted by Yaz. “No, just… I don’t know, he seems like the kind of guy who’s probably staking out my house. Don’t want to come home and find he’s torched the place, or anything. We could just… I don’t know, have phone calls or something instead.” 

“Phone calls.”

“Yeah. Like this one, only with less of me bleating on like a weirdo, a lot more laughing, and a lot less discussion of men.”

“Has something happened? Has he said something; done something?” 

“No,” Clara says again, more emphatically this time. She knows Yaz’s secret is not hers to tell, and there is no way she can begin to hint at what occurred between Yaz and Saxon without retelling the entire sorry saga. “I just feel like it would be safest. For both of us.” 

“OK,” Sephy says in a flat voice. “Fine.”

The line goes dead, and Clara is left blinking at the handset in mute consternation.

 

* * *

 

It’s not until two days later that she hears from Sephy again. It’s past 10 o’clock, the sky dark outside her window, when her phone rings and she checks the caller ID before answering it with a sense of trepidation.

“Hello,” Sephy says brightly, as though their previous conversation had not ended the way it had. “Thought we should catch up.” 

“Urm,” Clara blinks, disconcerted by the upbeat tone but determined to feign a sense of normalcy for Sephy’s sake. “Hi. How are you?” 

“Well,” Sephy enthuses, and Clara can all but see her smile. “Made a breakthrough on my dissertation today.”

She launches into a long spiel about perceptions of homosexuality in former colonies that Clara only half listens to, intent as she is on asking the one question that needs to be asked. She lets Sephy’s words wash over her, her voice warm and comforting, not taking in so much as a word. 

“So, what do you think?” Sephy asks at last, falling expectantly silent, and Clara takes a deep breath. 

“Why don’t you report him to the police?” she blurts, before her courage can fail her and she can lose her bottle. “Saxon?” 

“Because I won’t be believed,” Sephy says quietly, her volume dropping. “Because they won’t listen, and then he’ll just… step things up.” 

“But he controls every aspect of your life.” 

“I know.” 

“One psycho guy is controlling your entire life, without even technically being in it.”

“I know.”

“So, why don’t…” 

“Because they won’t do anything!” Sephy says in a rush, her words half-shouted, before she returns to a quieter tone, as though ashamed to have lost her composure: “I’ve tried, Clara, don’t you think I’ve tried? They laughed me out of there. Said there was nothing they could do, and shouldn’t I give the poor sod a chance?” 

“But he…”

“He’s very good at what he does. He doesn’t leave evidence trails, and when he does, they’re lovely, kind, sweet things – like asking you for the poems. They aren’t nasty, or creepy, or weird. They’re lovely devoted things, romantic things, things that I should find flattering. He’s a _nice man_ , you know, and nobody ever wants to consider that nice men are not in fact… you know, all that nice.” 

“I know,” Clara concurs quietly. “I know, Sephy.”

 

* * *

 

After that first evening, the phone calls become a nightly occurrence. As regular as clockwork, Clara’s phone rings at 10pm, and she puts her headphones on and loses herself in daft conversations with Sephy. It’s not the same as being with her physically – there’s the lack of nuanced gestures or nonverbal cues; the lack of a physical face to talk to; the lack of a shared space, or shared experiences such as food or drinks, but it’s still warm and familiar and… well, _fun_. Clara shudders at her mental use of the adjective, but there isn’t a better alternative – the two of them have fun, as much as is possible within the confines of their two separate rooms. They talk about literature and history and culture; about TV shows and films and the university; they talk about Yaz, sometimes, and Clara’s other customers; and they talk about the poems that Clara is still sending over out of necessity’s sake. They’re much more restrained now; much less effusive and overtly romantic, but they’re still being sent – a necessary evil, to keep Saxon from suspecting anything may be amiss. 

Clara considers Sephy something of a friend now – a tentative, uncertain label, but a label that she uses nonetheless. It’s lacking in conventionality, but so is every aspect of their friendship, and she only ever dares to think the word when she’s alone and in the privacy of her own head. 

After a week, the phone calls become video calls. This is better – this gives Clara something to look at, and looking at Sephy is like looking at the sun – somehow both blinding and warming, her smile as infectiously energising as sunlight. Somehow, when faced with a live video feed of Sephy, the laughter between them swells and bubbles all the more – now stories are accompanied by expressions, and gestures, and sweeping arm movements that sometimes result in things being dropped or spilled. Clara laughs until her stomach aches and her cheeks are wet with tears of mirth, wondering when she’d last felt this warm sense of comfort with anyone. 

Sephy is right – the portrait of her that Saxon had painted for Clara to write to is nothing like the person she actually is. The factual information may be there, the same likes and dislikes and interests, but the way she expresses herself and holds herself is entirely different; the way she _is_ refuses to conform to his desirous expectations. Clara had fallen in love with the shallow, superficial notion of _Persephone_ , a staid and demure woman. Now? Now she is increasingly enamoured with the bundle of energy and enthusiasm that is _Sephy_ , wild and unrestrained by societal expectations. 

Sephy, who cared so little for the name that her family chose for her that she crafted her own version of it, shunning their expectations of the girl they had christened as a goddess.

Sephy, who refused to conform to their ideas of what girls ‘should’ do, and instead crafted her own path.

Sephy, who against all odds managed to make her own way in the world, refusing to entertain their notions of compulsory heterosexuality and ‘marrying well;’ instead eschewing both in favour of embarking upon a academic career grounded in the study of the queer and all that so repelled them. 

And conversely… Sephy, who now fears the mention of the name Harry Saxon; who fears a man who is everything she is not – control and conformation and composure. A man intent on reclaiming her as property; reclaiming a woman as wild as the sea. 

Clara feels her heart break each time she thinks of the juxtaposition between the woman she knows and the woman who fears a mere man; the juxtaposition between the woman who turned her back on her family’s chosen path for her, and the woman who is afraid of a politics student and his obsessive attempt at love. She wants to help – more than anything, she craves the ability to intervene – and yet this, whatever it is, seems to be all Sephy craves. A small piece of normality, crafted each night in the magical time before the witching hour.

 

* * *

 

As they enter the final week in which Clara has been paid to write poetry for Sephy, her heart begins thud uncomfortably in her chest each day as things start to draw to a close. Will Saxon ask for more poems? Will he grow angry at her, blaming her for the fact that Sephy has not succumbed to his perceived charm, expressed via the medium of her romantic poems? Will he want to try something new; some unknown quantity?

Clara’s questions are answered on the penultimate day of poetry. As she steps out of the front door to head to university, she finds a vase on the doorstep filled with decrepit, rotting roses, the air displacement caused by the opening door causing a shower of petals to drift lazily to the ground. 

There is a note beside it, written in large looping handwriting on a black-edged notecard.

 _I know._  

Clara doesn’t stop to think. She heads back inside and slams the door shut behind her, taking a shuddering breath and reaching for her phone as she runs upstairs. As she stumbles into her bedroom, she dials Sephy’s number, and the line barely rings once before it’s answered. 

“He knows,” Sephy whispers, her voice cracked and tremulous. “He… how does he…” 

“Pack a bag.” 

“What?” 

“Pack a bag. I’ll be there in ten.”

“Clara…” 

“I’m not leaving you in this city with that lunatic any longer. Pack a bag.” 

She hangs up before Sephy can think about protesting, reaches for her suitcase, and starts shoving things haphazardly inside.

 

* * *

 

Sephy answers the door before she can knock, her eyes wide with terror. There’s a suitcase in the hallway behind her, and Clara nods once in approval as Sephy takes hold of it with a shaking hand and wheels it outside to the waiting taxi idling in the street. 

“Where are we going?” she asks, as they both climb into the back seats and the cab pulls away from the kerb. Her eyes are wild as she peers out of the window, darting around like a cornered animal’s would as it faced down a predator. “For how long?”

“Anywhere we like,” Clara says quietly, reaching for Sephy’s hand and squeezing it reassuringly. “For as long as we need.”

“You don’t have to do this,” Sephy says thickly, her eyes filling with tears. “Really. I’ll be-”

“ _She should know that I fall in love too fast and too hard,”_ Clara begins to recite from memory. The notebook is tucked into the top of her suitcase, a biro clipped to the spine. She doesn’t know where they’re going, but she senses, somehow, that they’ll need this. “ _Romantic love, platonic love; love in all its forms and glory. She should know that this feels like a fire starting. She should know that this isn’t a fire I want to extinguish._ ” 

“I don’t…" 

“I fell in love with you too fast,” Clara whispers, her voice breaking. “Both the first time, and the second.” 

“You mean…” 

“I mean that if you’ll have me,” Clara takes a deep breath, a single tear bisecting her cheek. “I’ll run with you until the end of time.”

There’s a beat of silence. A pregnant pause, full of expectant and yearning. 

At last, after what feels like an eternity, Sephy nods, and Clara leans across the space between them and kisses her – gently, hesitantly, terrified that she might break away. 

It feels like a new beginning. 

It feels like hope.

 

* * *

 

Some months later, when the dust has at last settled, they contact Yaz with an invitation. It’s nothing ostentatious or over-thought; just a subtle, well-timed text message with a postcode, date, and time. There’s no response forthcoming, which worries them, until they turn up on the allotted day and find her stood outside their destination in a navy-blue dress with two strangers in mismatched shirts and ties. One looks to be about Yaz’s age, a dark-skinned young man with a warm, friendly smile, while the other seems old enough to be his grandad, hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets as he contemplates them with a curious expression. 

“Hi!” Yaz enthuses warmly, stepping forwards and embracing them both, and Clara is immediately grateful to note that there appears to be no lingering ill will there. “Oh, god, it’s so good to see you both. I can’t actually believe you’re doing this though, it’s mad. Romantic, but mad.”

“What’s the lesbian equivalent of a shotgun wedding?” the older man asks in a forthright tone, and Sephy laughs at his total lack of self-awareness. “Is that a thing that lesbians can even do? Have a shotgun wedding?” 

“Graham!” Yaz looks mortified and smacks him on the arm. “You can’t say things like that!”

“I don’t think it’s a shotgun wedding,” Clara tilts her head to the side, surveying him with amusement. Whoever these strangers are, they seem to make Yaz feel at ease, which can never be a bad thing, and the strapping has gone from her wrist. The scars of the past, fading away. “Maybe… a _Saxon_ wedding.” 

“Wouldn’t that involve like, furs and helmets and swords and stuff?” the younger man asks, oblivious to the dark nature of the joke, and Sephy grins. 

“He’s got a point,” she tells her partner, reaching over and wrapping her arms around Clara’s waist. “We should’ve brought our swords. Yaz, aren’t you going to introduce us to your new friends?” 

“Sorry,” Yaz’s cheeks flush. “This is my new housemate, Ryan, and his grandad, Graham.”

“What happened to our pl-” 

“I dropped out,” Yaz shrugs, feigning nonchalance, but Clara can tell that there’s a story there to tell – one for another time, and another place. “It all got a bit much, so I took off back to Sheffield. Sonya wouldn’t relinquish my room, so I had to look elsewhere, and Ryan was advertising in the paper. Turned up and realised we went to school together, as luck would have it, so I knew he wasn’t an axe murderer.”

“You dropped out?!” Sephy looks scandalised by the prospect. “But you were doing so well!”

“ _You_ both dropped out!” Yaz protests, scowling at them. “And you’re both doing alright! And it’s not like I’m making nothing of myself – joined the police and everything.”

“Yeah?” Clara raises her eyebrows, both surprised and pleased by this nugget of information. 

“I don’t want anyone else to feel like you two have,” Yaz says quietly, her expression growing suddenly serious. “I want people who are experiencing things like Sephy did with Saxon to actually feel listened to. To actually feel like their cases are being taken into account, and that they have someone on their side.” 

“That’s…” Clara begins, impressed, but is cut off by Graham before she can finish her sentence. 

“Not wishing to be difficult or anything, but haven’t you two got an appointment with a registrar?” he asks, checking his watch. “Because I believe it’s about to begin.” 

“Graham, it’s not just them two,” Yaz shoots him a chastising look. “They need witnesses, don’t they?” 

“Right,” he looks sheepish, and Clara realises why Yaz has brought them along. “And then they also need a meal.” 

“Grandad,” Ryan rolls his eyes in exasperation as Yaz bites back a giggle. “Weddings are more important than your stomach.”

“I don’t know, they’re both pretty exciting and pretty crucial,” Sephy says seriously, pressing a kiss to Clara’s neck. “So, what do you say? Shall we get married?” 

“What a wonderful idea.”

 

* * *

 

_You were scared_

_The first time I saw you; incomplete and wanting_

_Afraid to admit your own fear and yearning._

_But you warmed with each passing hour we spent_

_Those magical hours of darkness that precipitated_

_Our flight from a place in which we found only danger._

_You smiled more, you learned to love_

_You opened up to me in a way that scared and thrilled you_

_I did the same_

_I let you in; I showed you who I was_

_And we both found that home isn’t a place;_

_Home is wherever I am with you._


End file.
